Weekend Open Thread

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Submitted by motherbelt on Sat, 12/24/2011 - 8:14am.

As I get older, it gets easier, because I don't fret as much about everything being "perfect" for everyone. I get everyone a gift, but it doesn't have to be the "perfect" gift; at this point I realize it really is the thought that counts.

This evening our daughter and son-in-law will be joining us for dinner (they go to his family on Christmas Day), we will open our gifts and go to Mass together.

Tomorrow will be a quiet day for my husband and me.

To get everyone started with a smile on Christmas Eve, take a look at this, probably the Cutest Christmas Video Ever.

(N.B. at the end of the credits it says "Based on a true story.")

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Breaking a vow

Submitted by mandrake on Sat, 12/24/2011 - 10:28am.

I know I did promise to shutup till 2012 due a recent run in with The Vet, but I really do want to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!

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I would like to wish everyone

Submitted by ThePickle on Sat, 12/24/2011 - 12:34pm.

I would like to wish everyone here a very Merry Christmas.... and in the interest of political correctness,to those in the know, have a Happy Hanukkah, a wish for my "undocumented" (as well as documented) brethren for a Feliz Navidad, a wish for a joyous Kwanzaa to my brothers and sisters of the Non- Caucasian Persuasion and a big shout out to all my Pagan peeps...uh.... have a wonderful Gaknars Ascension!?!

(If I forgot anyone I am sure some surly lib without the vaguest notion of a sense of humor will be along to castigate me for my grievous faux pas)

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The King Arrives!!!

Submitted by killa37 on Sat, 12/24/2011 - 1:28pm.

My #2 son - the Coast Guard officer - left the island yesterday afternoon with his girlfriend to fly back to the East Coast. He's stationed in Miami, but he's going to spend Christmas with her and her parents in Charlottesville, Va. - where he met her while he was going to graduate school. I had a great time seeing him - we surfed a few times, and he got to play some golf and volleyball down at the beach court, as well as show his girlfriend around the island and do things with her.

Anyway, the routine is usually this - you fly from here to Honolulu, then you board another plane to fly up to the mainland. We do have some direct flights out of here, but they go to the 'usual' places, and my son wasn't going that route. So around dark I get a text from my son, and he says that they're delayed, because Boy Barry is arriving (at Hickam AFB, NOT Honolulu Airport), and everything is on lockdown until he shows up!!! So I turned on the local news, which I NEVER watch, and it's a total slobberfest as everybody is anxiously awaiting the second coming of the Messiah..................and when he finally does show up, they weren't in any hurry to get the cavalcade motorcade going.............so traffic was hung up along the route, and the airport was still moribound!! My son texted me a while later.........was still sitting there, but was probably going to leave sometime soon. Needless to say, he wasn't very happy about it, and I can't repeat what the text said!!!

So, from sunny Hawaii - birthplace of our Royal King, our Most Exalted Won, our (D)Ear Leader, our Father who is ABOVE heaven - Merry Christmas and Mele Kalikimaka!!!

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20 centuries ago Astrology was the "hot" science.

Submitted by upcountrywater on Sat, 12/24/2011 - 3:39pm.

Twinkle, Twinkle: An astronomer says the Star of Bethlehem was Jupiter (NRO, 021221)

http://kwing.christiansonnet.org/church-news/church__general.htm

John J. Miller

If the Star of Bethlehem were to appear in the sky tonight, you probably wouldn’t even notice it. It wasn’t a blazing comet, an exploding supernova, or any of the other spectacular celestial events people in search of a natural explanation have proposed. Instead, says astronomer Michael Molnar, it was the planet Jupiter appearing in the sign of Aries and rising in the east on the morning of April 17, 6 B.C.

If that doesn’t sound like a big deal, it’s because you’re thinking like someone who lives in the 21st century. Two millennia ago, it would have sparked the imaginations of expert stargazers — and signaled the birth of a king.

“I never believed I would work on this topic,” says Molnar, a former Rutgers University professor. “I just figured the Star of Bethlehem was one of those mysteries in the Bible.”

The detective story behind Molnar’s theory starts with a coin he bought at a New York show in 1990. “My hobby is collecting ancient Greek and Roman coins that have stars and moons on them,” says Molnar. “For $50, I bought a bronze coin that’s about the size of an American quarter. It has Zeus on one side and Aries the ram with a star above it on the other.”

A few months later, Molnar started to examine the coin closely. He writes for numismatic publications such as The Celator, and began to research what he considered to be the most interesting feature on his coin: the star above Aries the ram. Among ancient astrologers, Molnar learned, Aries the ram was a symbol of Judea. “I realized that Aries is where ancient astrologers would have been looking for a sign indicating the birth of a new king,” he says. “With the coin, I had stumbled across this really important clue.”

Molnar described a few initial ideas about the Star of Bethlehem in an article for Sky and Telescope magazine. He thought his involvement would end there. Then the dean of historical astronomy called him. “I’d read articles and books by Owen Gingerich of Harvard University, but we’d never spoken,” says Molnar. “His call came completely out of the blue, and he said he thought I was really onto something. This encouraged me to do more research.”

He worked on the question for five years, studying Greek versions of the Bible and the writings of Roman astronomers. “Today we know Jupiter is a planet, but to the ancient astronomers it was an important star, and it was linked to the birth of kings,” says Molnar. The position of other planets, plus the sun and the moon, also carried special meanings. Today, astronomers and astrologers are very different sorts of people. Twenty centuries ago, however, there wasn’t a distinction.

Working on a computer, Molnar learned that the morning of April 17, 6 B.C. contained all the elements he was looking for: Jupiter rose in the east, in the sign of Aries the ram. Joining it in Aries were the sun, the moon, and Saturn — events that would have added to the moment’s extraordinary significance for the ancients.

“The basic elements of this event occur once every 60 years — in other words, once a lifetime,” says Molnar.

But there’s more: Mars and Mercury weren’t in Aries, and they also weren’t in positions that would have wrecked the divine interpretation. Mars is notorious for upending astrological events by showing up in the wrong part of the sky when everything else is in seeming alignment.

“If you think like an ancient astronomer would have thought, this event would have been extraordinarily exciting,” says Molnar.

The account describing the Star of Bethlehem is contained wholly within the Gospel of Matthew — the other gospels don’t mention it at all — lending credence to the idea that the star didn’t light up the night sky like a 4th of July fireworks display. A close reading of the Bible suggests that nobody saw the star but the wise men, which may be a way of saying that only the wise men had the astrological knowledge necessary for interpreting the events of April 17 the way they did.

Many Biblical scholars believe the birth of Jesus probably occurred between 8 B.C. and 4 B.C. The event Molnar describes took place in 6 B.C. — “right smack dab in the middle,” he says.

Molnar describes his ideas in detail in his 1999 book, The Star of Bethlehem: The Legacy of the Magi. It was written mainly for scholars, but intelligent and interested lay readers won’t have trouble following his arguments. It may be impossible to know whether Molnar has provided a correct interpretation, but it is possible to believe he has offered a very good one. (He also has a worthwhile website, which includes additional information, pictures of coins, etc.)

Bradley E. Schaefer of the University of Texas calls Molnar’s book, “the first revolution in star of Bethlehem research since the days of Kepler.” Adds Gingerich of Harvard: “The Star of Bethlehem is a fascinating contribution to the immense literature that attempts to come to terms with the Christmas Star represented in Matthew’s Gospel. In my opinion, this book is the most original and important contribution of the entire twentieth century on the thorny question of how events recorded there should be interpreted.”

I asked Molnar whether he is a man of faith himself. “I don’t discuss my faith,” he says. “I stay religiously neutral. I like to say that I’m faithful to the historical record; there’s definitely a historical basis for that passage in the Bible. I get letters from all sorts of people telling me that my book has reinforced their faith, and this has been an unexpected and pleasing result.”

Molnar would like to put out a popular version of his book. “I’m thinking of a coffee-table book with lots of pictures,” he says. “Something less technical.” He’d also like to update his technical account, because more information has come to his attention since it was published three years ago, particularly about the magi and who they might have been.

But for now, we have a wonderful book written by a scientist that emboldens people of faith — who in the past have felt threatened by astronomers telling them the earth isn’t the center of the universe, the sun is a fairly minor body on the outskirts of an ordinary galaxy, and that the moment of creation occurred 15 billion years ago in a big bang.

Yes, Virginia, there really was a Star of Bethlehem.

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Good grief, faster than previously thought!

Submitted by jon_torlin on Sat, 12/24/2011 - 8:32pm.

I know this was brought up before, and this comes as no surprise, except in the speed of which it is occurring, but it looks like Iraq's already tearing itself apart at the seams.

Iraqi political unraveling

So it's a question of which will occur first, Iraq just coming apart and ending up like Libya, or coming apart and ending up like Egypt?  Either way, the one thing that's obvious is that it's coming apart.  If I read it right, it has to do with the Iraqi president being a shiite and his VP a sunni and just started fighting each other again after having their conflicts on hold for the last several years.

Wow, I wonder if this is what's to be the new Middle East War against each other?  Those sunnis and shiites, and all those others are just going to end up fighting and killing each other no matter what "diplomatic" overtures are thrown their way.

Just out of curiosity, does anyone know which Muslim sect Obeyme was raised as?  I'm having a hard time nailing it down.  It fits that he as a Muslim would foment violence against other Muslims as is their history and their lot in life in the Middle East.

-Jon

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Dem Hawks

Submitted by Boudin on Sat, 12/24/2011 - 8:36pm.

Suck. Good grief

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God Bless all of NB's patrons

Submitted by Boudin on Sun, 12/25/2011 - 2:20am.

Yes that includes all the trolls,

Merry Christmas all of us, my best wishes for everyone!

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Just dropping in to wish all a very merry Kalikimaka

Submitted by Denny Crane on Sun, 12/25/2011 - 5:25am.

メリークリスマス

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Just saw on Drudge

Submitted by Radical1979 on Mon, 12/26/2011 - 12:40am.

Junior ROTC members of the Muslim faith will now be allowed to wear hijabs with the uniform.

I really fear the day my daughter and I will be forced to wear burkas in this country.

Oh, and the religion of peace bombed some churches today.

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GO FALCONS!

Submitted by Dave. on Mon, 12/26/2011 - 4:32pm.

-Dave

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